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[John Petrucci]

- Character Creator

I mentioned this in another trailer thread, but I really do think Bioware needs to show this off soon. I've seen many comments from people complaining that they don't want to play with the default Ryders' faces.

I'm still not sure how there are Bioware fans that don't understand they'll be able to alter their appearance (maybe lots of gamers commenting who haven't played a Bioware game in the last decade), but there are...so Bioware might want to clear it up with some kind of demonstration and make some good looking Ryders. However it's possible it's just a small but vocal minority who really need to see the character creator to understand we'll be able to customize our appearance. Hopefully so.

DAI's face customization was probably my favorite in any game ever, so I'm super pumped for what we'll be able to do in MEA.

And oh yea, I love Cora.

 

[kboyrulez12345]

I'm curious, do ya'll have an opinion on Mass Effect Andromeda's composer, John Paesano? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Paesano

If anyone has heard of his previous work, I'd be interested to know what are your thoughts on it.

 

[Mindlog]

I'm curious, do ya'll have an opinion on Mass Effect Andromeda's composer, John Paesano? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Paesano

If anyone has heard of his previous work, I'd be interested to know what are your thoughts on it.

Going through his catalog now. Seems like standard cinema scoring. Some of his Daredevil work could slide into ME pretty easily iirc. I don't believe making a Mass Effect sounding soundtrack is that hard. The tricky part is getting around designers that push for 'epic emotional tracks' that typically blows out orchestration over a 'cheaper' synth sound.

This is kind of interesting though. From 2012. Right around when development started? Funny coincidence. Looking at the comments I forgot about the Mass Effect movie that was on the table at one point. I wonder if Warcraft and Assassin's Creed killed that plan.

 

[DeadlyParasite]

I'm curious, do ya'll have an opinion on Mass Effect Andromeda's composer, John Paesano? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Paesano

If anyone has heard of his previous work, I'd be interested to know what are your thoughts on it.

Hard to formulate an opinion without at least hearing some of his work for Andromeda. I don't think the briefings are an accurate gauge of that.

That said they've done this sort of thing before with Mass Effect 3 and Clint Mansell. Unfortunately I found his work to be the least interesting and most out of place on that soundtrack. Dragging in movie composers to work on game series they have no experience with never seems to end well. Which is why I'm sad Sam Hulick, Jack Wall, and the rest of the trilogy team aren't returning.

 

[Renekton]

Thanks I'm checking out John Paesano tracks:

- Daredevil - Intro
- Maze Runner - Into the Maze
- Maze Runner - Final Fight

Seems standard Hollywood, the man loves him some strings. If there is an ongoing mystery, it'll probably sound fantasy-like instead of Jack Wall's dark space Cthulhu.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

I finished Mass Effect about 5 times and Mass Effect 2 about 10 times, but after ME3 came out the ending soured me so badly on the series that I pretty much never wanted to play it again as of 2012. The DLC came out, and I wanted to try Citadel and stuff, so ~2014 I did make an effort to play again. I switched from Xbox 360 to PC for ME3, and attempted to use the save converters to import my save. I fucked something basic up and so it never worked in 2012, but when I tried to play through again in 2014, I managed to do it right, so I actually had my "canon" Shepard. I was keen to see things play out as I wanted them to. But then I got like 2 hours in and went "lol nah son".

This year I finally worked up the effort necessary to continue that playthrough, finish the DLC packs for the game and so on. Today I got to Priority: Rannoch and as hilarious as it is to see Tali die and the Quarians burn, I wanted to actually resolve the conflict this time round. That wasn't an option in my first playthrough of ME3, since I didn't get to import anything. So I do the mission... and I didn't get an option to do it either. I look up the requirements - apparently I accidentally skipped the Geth Server mission which is an instant fail. My only save game prior to this mission is like 2 hours of progress ago, which would be enough to make me rage normally. But then I start looking at the other requirements too, and I start getting unsure of whether I've fulfilled them. Did I win Tali's trial without presenting the evidence? Don't remember. Did I resolve the dispute between Legion and Tali up front? Don't remember. I fire up Gibbed's ME2 save editor, some updated version, and it tells me that Tali's dad was not posthumously exiled. I think that's good. But it doesn't say "Tali cleared of charges (loyal)", either, even though clearly she was. The henchman section says both Tali and Legion were loyal. Does that mean Tali was NOT loyal, but then became loyal again? Or is it a bug, or something else?

Does anybody happen to know if there's a way I can check properly? Because I don't want to rewind several hours of game, play it again, then find out that lol actually I'm fucked. I definitely rewrote the heretics, so basically whether I fulfil the criteria or not lives or dies on whether or not I resolved the dispute on the ship. The playthrough was like 5 years ago at this point so there's no way I'm going to remember specifically.

 

[Patryn]

I'm curious, do ya'll have an opinion on Mass Effect Andromeda's composer, John Paesano? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Paesano

If anyone has heard of his previous work, I'd be interested to know what are your thoughts on it.

Is he really the composer, or is this a Clint Mansell thing where they hype him up and then he only writes 2 songs?

 

[prag16]

On, sweet. Another topic in general gaming seemingly with the sole purpose of drive by shitting on the game. -_-

 

[WadiumArcadium]

On, sweet. Another topic in general gaming seemingly with the sole purpose of drive by shitting on the game. -_-

I don't think I've seen such a negative build up to a game on this forum since Federation Force.

 

[prag16]

I don't think I've seen such a negative build up to a game on this forum since Federation Force.

Yeah. And won't see one this negative again until Dragon Age 4 or maybe Detroit. Gaf hates David Cage almost as much as Bioware.

Meanwhile the Killzone Shadowfall devs of all people get infinitely more benefit of the doubt diving into a genre they've never tackled with a game that shows many signs of the dreaded Ubisoft open world design? (Don't get me wrong Horizon looks really good on the whole but just noting the contrast).

In that thread, I'm not necessarily sold on the article's premise and reasoning. But the replies. God damn.

 

[Tovarisc]

On, sweet. Another topic in general gaming seemingly with the sole purpose of drive by shitting on the game. -_-

You have to admit, article they are throwing shit at is clearly written by very, very hardcore ME fan who ignores and/or dismisses other games even trying to do similar thing as ME(A). Writer acknowledges Horizon: Zero Dawn to exist, but ignores everything about it while proceeds to hype and fanboy over MEA. As far I know Horizon will be very story driven experience.

Writer even seems to toss Red Dead Redemption 2 aside because it isn't pure SP experience? Okay he assumes that RDR2 will have MP component, but MEA has.

Also why writer ignored games like Torment: Tides of Numenera, Divinity: Original Sin II or Vampyr? There is strong narrative focused RPG's coming out in 2017.

Articles like this aren't inherently bad, but one can understand why structure and tone of such article may rub not-so-dedicated fan / follower in wrong way because it reads like marketing piece.

Article: http://www.glixel.com/news/why-mass-effect-andromeda-matters-in-2017-w463105

 

[prag16]

You have to admit, article they are throwing shit at is clearly written by very, very hardcore ME fan who ignores and/or dismisses other games even trying to do similar thing as ME(A). Writer acknowledges Horizon: Zero Dawn to exist, but ignores everything about it while proceeds to hype and fanboy over MEA. As far I know Horizon will be very story driven experience.

Writer even seems to toss Red Dead Redemption 2 aside because it isn't pure SP experience? Okay he assumes that RDR2 will have MP component, but MEA has.

Also why writer ignored games like Torment: Tides of Numenera, Divinity: Original Sin II or Vampyr? There is strong narrative focused RPG's coming out in 2017.

Articles like this aren't inherently bad, but one can understand why structure and tone of such article may rub not-so-dedicated fan / follower in wrong way because it reads like marketing piece.

Article: http://www.glixel.com/news/why-mass-effect-andromeda-matters-in-2017-w463105

I don't disagree. Though see my edit above on Horizon, and a lot of people don't like the Rockstar game design/structure (GTA 4,5 and RDR all absolutely bored me to tears).

But yeah as I said above the article isnt great. Mostly just marveling at how angry and visceral a reaction it caused on gaf.

 

[LeonSKennedy90]

I don't disagree. Though see my edit above on Horizon, and a lot of people don't like the Rockstar game design/structure (GTA 4,5 and RDR all absolutely bored me to tears).

But yeah as I said above the article isnt great. Mostly just marveling at how angry and visceral a reaction it caused on gaf.

"*blank* is the greatest thing" threads are always a bad idea, because it sets itself up as a competiton. This thing vs everything else. It encourages people to come in and say, "no, actually, *blank*, *blank*, and *blank* are the greatest things ever".

So couple that with a game many people have been VERY critical of(not without fair reason tbh, I mean that last trailer was lol), telling them its the best was just a recipe for disaster, discussion wise.

 

[prag16]

"*blank* is the greatest thing" threads are always a bad idea, because it sets itself up as a competiton. This thing vs everything else. It encourages people to come in and say, "no, actually, *blank*, *blank*, and *blank* are the greatest things ever".

So couple that with a game many people have been VERY critical of(not without fair reason tbh, I mean that last trailer was lol), telling them its the best was just a recipe for disaster, discussion wise.

Yeah the author should have framed it as "important" on its own rather than MOST important (while mentioning and dismissing other games). However I doubt that would have changed the gaf reaction drastically ("trailer was lol" you know that kind of reasoned and coherent argument). Though without the click bait title perhaps a thread never even gets created.

 

[Daemul]

Does anybody happen to know if there's a way I can check properly? Because I don't want to rewind several hours of game, play it again, then find out that lol actually I'm fucked. I definitely rewrote the heretics, so basically whether I fulfil the criteria or not lives or dies on whether or not I resolved the dispute on the ship. The playthrough was like 5 years ago at this point so there's no way I'm going to remember specifically.

If Gibbed says that Tali's dad was not posthumously exiled then that's a good sign, since it means that you didn't hand over the evidence and thus you would have gotten her loyalty.

Gibbed not showing whether she was cleared of all charges is easily solvable, since the simple way of finding that out is whether Tali is an Admiral in your ME3 save. If the answer is no, and Tali's isn't an Admiral, that means that she was exiled. This would also explain why Gibbed would show Tali being found guilty and thus exiled, and yet still being marked as loyal.

Remember, in ME2 Tali can be made loyal in two ways, either by using the Charm/Intimidate persuasion options and thus getting Tali acquitted of all charges, or in the case of the persuasion options not being able or you choosing not to use them, Shepard on Tali's request can choose the option to say that they found no evidence on the Alerai in order to save her father from getting posthumously exiled, but this leads to Tali getting exiled, though she still gives you her loyalty.

On whether you solved the argument between Tali and Legion the first time without losing either of their loyalty, I'm not sure how you would track that, there's no indicator in game for it like there is for whether she was found guilty or not. If Tali in your save isn't an Admiral then it wouldn't matter anyway, but if she is then that means you used the persuasion options, which would also likely mean that you were able to settle the argument between her and Legion as well.

I would advise you to use Gibbeds ME3 Editor though, since it would probably give you clearer answers than the ME2 one on exactly what you did.

 

[kboyrulez12345]

Is he really the composer, or is this a Clint Mansell thing where they hype him up and then he only writes 2 songs?

From the looks of this article, it would seem that the only thing confirmed about him is that he composed the main theme: http://www.vgmonline.net/mass-effect-andromeda-composer-and-soundtrack-details/

So I guess it's possible he could be co-composing with someone else, or perhaps he's just involved with the main theme of the game.

 

[diaspora]

The salt in the Glixel thread.

 

[prag16]

The salt in the Glixel thread.

The same people who decided DA:I was awful garbage without playing it have already declared ME:A to be awful garbage. Film at 11.

(I actually had some serious issues with DA:I myself. But that's beside the point.)

 

[Dandy Lyin]

On, sweet. Another topic in general gaming seemingly with the sole purpose of drive by shitting on the game. -_-

Pass. I'm done reading MEA threads in gaming.

 

[DevilDog]

Pass. I'm done reading MEA threads in gaming.

This is the last safe haven. I still think that even if MEA ends up being horrible, this thread will retain its sanity.

 

[Mediking]

I'm super excited for Andromeda. Anti hype threads for it on GAF aren't really shaking my excitement for it.

 

[JeffG]

I'm super excited for Andromeda. Anti hype threads for it on GAF aren't really shaking my excitement for it.

I personally find those threads amusing. It does show that Bioware games are still a big deal. If people didnt care others wouldn't expend so much energy in tearing them down.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

If Gibbed says that Tali's dad was not posthumously exiled then that's a good sign, since it means that you didn't hand over the evidence and thus you would have gotten her loyalty.

Gibbed not showing whether she was cleared of all charges is easily solvable, since the simple way of finding that out is whether Tali is an Admiral in your ME3 save. If the answer is no, and Tali's isn't an Admiral, that means that she was exiled. This would also explain why Gibbed would show Tali being found guilty and thus exiled, and yet still being marked as loyal.

Remember, in ME2 Tali can be made loyal in two ways, either by using the Charm/Intimidate persuasion options and thus getting Tali acquitted of all charges, or in the case of the persuasion options not being able or you choosing not to use them, Shepard on Tali's request can choose the option to say that they found no evidence on the Alerai in order to save her father from getting posthumously exiled, but this leads to Tali getting exiled, though she still gives you her loyalty.

On whether you solved the argument between Tali and Legion the first time without losing either of their loyalty, I'm not sure how you would track that, there's no indicator in game for it like there is for whether she was found guilty or not. If Tali in your save isn't an Admiral then it wouldn't matter anyway, but if she is then that means you used the persuasion options, which would also likely mean that you were able to settle the argument between her and Legion as well.

I would advise you to use Gibbeds ME3 Editor though, since it would probably give you clearer answers than the ME2 one on exactly what you did.

The ME3 editor didn't help with the remaining question (i.e. did I solve it through persuade or not), but luckily it seems I did. I pushed through it and got it done, praise jeebus.

I'm still kinda mad that the peace solution is so esoteric.

 

[X-Frame]

I'm super excited for Andromeda. Anti hype threads for it on GAF aren't really shaking my excitement for it.

They're not affecting me one bit whatsoever. In fact, each piece of pre-release media or information only makes me more excited.

It is unfortunate that it seems like I need to add ME:A to my list of games I won't go into Gaming for, along with Destiny.

 

[Bombless]

The ME3 editor didn't help with the remaining question (i.e. did I solve it through persuade or not), but luckily it seems I did. I pushed through it and got it done, praise jeebus.

I'm still kinda mad that the peace solution is so esoteric.

It makes sense to me that getting the peace resolution would be complicated/hard, it's the ONE thing even the Reapers consider impossible. I just wish Shepard actually shoved that in Starkid's face at the end.

 

[EatChildren]

On the last legs of my final Mass Effect 3. Currently finishing Citadel before going through to the attack on Cerberus HQ for the end game run.

As much as I love Citadel, replaying really enforces my belief it's not a "canon" in the continuity, or at best fits terribly in the flow of events, and is very, very much intended to be played post game. Tonally it's so goofy and an obvious send off; I don't feel it has any real place in the flow of events, and is very much a product of its time, something experienced by most players after the negativity swarming around the ending. It's the series love letter that almost exists as its own weird purgatorial thing.

I think Omega is my favourite of the DLC packs, in the grand scheme of things. It plays exceptionally well. Montreal really killed it with the encounters.

 

[DeadlyParasite]

On the last legs of my final Mass Effect 3. Currently finishing Citadel before going through to the attack on Cerberus HQ for the end game run.

As much as I love Citadel, replaying really enforces my belief it's not a "canon" in the continuity, or at best fits terribly in the flow of events, and is very, very much intended to be played post game. Tonally it's so goofy and an obvious send off; I don't feel it has any real place in the flow of events, and is very much a product of its time, something experienced by most players after the negativity swarming around the ending. It's the series love letter that almost exists as its own weird purgatorial thing.

I think Omega is my favourite of the DLC packs, in the grand scheme of things. It plays exceptionally well. Montreal really killed it with the encounters.

I think all three add-ons are very well made and add something to the overall experience, even if Omega or Citadel don't directly contribute anything towards the ending. Citadel offers an escape with absurdity and sometimes you just need a little cheese in your life, even if it doesn't match the overall tone. Francis Kitts Hamlet with a Pyjak and Javiks Blasto the Hanar Spectre moment still give me a chuckle every time.

But speaking of near the end, I finished my own final playthrough today. Even though i'll play the games again in the future this time felt particularly special being this close to Andromeda's release. Like passing the metaphorical torch and moving onto a new chapter.

I know Liara gets a lot of hate for getting special treatment by the writers, yadda yadda, but I always find her farewell at the end of 3 to be the most meaningful.

Gets me right in the feels every time.

Sigh, 50 days to go.

 

[DevilDog]

Citadel DLC is truly meant to be experienceds months after you finish up the game.

It's always my recommendation to newcomers, but they end up playing it before the game ends.
Afterwards they tell me that I was right and that they should've listened to me. Sigh.

 

[EatChildren]

 

[SugarDave]

On the last legs of my final Mass Effect 3. Currently finishing Citadel before going through to the attack on Cerberus HQ for the end game run.

As much as I love Citadel, replaying really enforces my belief it's not a "canon" in the continuity, or at best fits terribly in the flow of events, and is very, very much intended to be played post game. Tonally it's so goofy and an obvious send off; I don't feel it has any real place in the flow of events, and is very much a product of its time, something experienced by most players after the negativity swarming around the ending. It's the series love letter that almost exists as its own weird purgatorial thing.

I couldn't agree more. I will vehemently encourage new players to make sure Citadel is the last thing in the trilogy they see until the end of time.

Also, I think this is new information?

There's a little tidbit of info I wanted to share that twitter didn't seem like the right medium for, so I thought I'd give it to y'all here.

By default, most guns in the game (the Milky Way ones, at least) work via disposable thermal clips, like in ME2 and 3. This is the "default user experience" for most guns in MEA.

However! Since we know some of you prefer the old-school approach, we have something called the Vintage Heat Sink. This is a piece of ME1-era tech that you can use when crafting a weapon to make it work more like the guns in ME1 did, with endless ammo but an overheat mechanic, rather than using disposable thermal clips as "ammo." So if you want your Avenger or Carnifex (or whatever) to behave ME1-style, that's entirely possible.

Anyway, I thought some of you might appreciate that.

http://bsn.boards.net/thread/3649/vintage-heat-sink

 

[Poodlestrike]

I couldn't agree more. I will vehemently encourage new players to make sure Citadel is the last thing in the trilogy they see until the end of time.

Also, I think this is new information?



http://bsn.boards.net/thread/3649/vintage-heat-sink

Oh, that's fun! I might use that for an assault rifle, something where short bursts are preferable anyway.

 

[Sou Da]

New thread, new news?

 

[Maledict]

I really, really didn't want to see weapon crafting there... ;-(

Hopefully it's just mods for weapons, and not actual weapon stats and the like.

 

[DevilDog]

Whats wrong with weapon crafting?

 

[Tovarisc]

Whats wrong with weapon crafting?

Can lead down the path where crafting is only way to obtain good armor and weapons => gathering is made mandatory farming, not everyone likes that.

 

[Maledict]

Whats wrong with weapon crafting?

Because I honestly have not yet encountered an rpg in recent years that has done it well at all.

Firstly, it means harvesting, which is generally tedious. Secondly, the weapons are generally overpowered because you can build them to specific stats whereas normal gear can't go there.

In general I think crafting is a bad mechanic that's been shoehorned into RPGs because MMOs have it, and I've yet to really find my game enhanced because of it. It adds grind and tedium, and reduces the impact of finding new great loot.

 

[Poodlestrike]

So long as gathering is reasonably well optimized, I have no issues with this. Especially if there's not any dropped loot to pick up and use, which frankly makes a lot more sense for a sci-fi setting.

 

[Ivory Samoan]

I like what I hear regarding this vintage thermal clip and the recent crafting news....good times.

 

[DevilDog]

Well it depends.

If we extract our materials from the mouth's of huge monsters on desolate, dangerous planets it sounds good, doesn't it? It would also give us yet another reason to explore.

I do agree with the balance skepticism, it may complicate things too much.

 

[Ridesh]

I'm convinced that this game will live or die depending of the side content quality, people will punish it if the side quest quality isn't near W3 instead of DAI.

Another thing that worries me so far, it's that the trailers are failing to comunicate the galactic adventure scale that the game supposedly has, DAI for example had such a short critical path.

 

[DeadlyParasite]

I'm really interested in what weapon types that applies to. I can just imagine non-burst high-damage sniper rifles taking advantage of that the most.

 

[Mindlog]

I'm the opposite.
I would much rather have the resource gathering be boring. Especially since we're talking about Milky Way weapons being upgraded by Milky Way technology. There's no reason an alien spleen should play into the equation.

However, I would rather make resource gathering trivial and have crafting revolve around building relationships with the experts that should really be doing the work. I could actually see SAM working well with this system as it could also work with the old weapon level loot that I hate. Instead of pretending the manufacturer of the Harrier rifle really built Harrier I-X weapon levels could be a reflection of SAM refining them to suit your needs better.

I hate RPG loot unbound by context.

Gillian casts level 3 warp.

 

[Poodlestrike]

Yeah, I would definitely trivialize or automate most crafting/strike] gathering, though using the big Remnant tech beasts as DAI dragon analogues isn't a bad idea.

Having relationship with crafting specialists play a large role is interesting.

 

[Reckless Onion]

What do we know about the MP? Is it just going to be a horde mode or will they set it up like destiny strike's? Where you do a mission with a boss at the end.

Wasn't it like that is inquisition? sort of like a mission with bosses? Never played it

 

[Nodnol]

Started my playthrough for all three games before Andromeda. Just done the Luna VI mission. Loooooong road ahead, but I should be able to get done by the time March rolls.

Any concise info out there for Andromeda? Considering Mass Effect is probably my favourite game series, ever, I'm suprisinypnot ignorant.

Can't wait for new lore and an expansion of the universe. It dawned on me, that if humanity thought to send pathfinders out towards Andromeda...maybe another race from a different Reaper cycle thought the same? Would be interesting to come across a race descended from those fleeing from the Reapers hundreds of thousands of years ago.

 

[diaspora]

I hope I never hear about anything related to the reapers ever again.

 

[SliChillax]

I hope I never hear about anything related to the reapers ever again.

I love the Reapers, I wish we could explore more about them. Where do they hibernate every 50,000 years? Do they have their own planet? What about the Leviathans? Sure there must be some that escaped to Andromeda maybe, who knows?

 

[N7 MRP Weasel]

What's the chances of us getting like a character creator video or a fat ass vidoc that's like 20 minutes? All before launch?

Can't fucking wait guys!!

Does anyone have any info on this?

 

[Yeul]

What's the chances of us getting like a character creator video or a fat ass vidoc that's like 20 minutes? All before launch?

Can't fucking wait guys!!

Does anyone have any info on this?

A long gameplay video is coming soon and one of the devs on Twitter said a character creator video was a possibility.

 

[N7 MRP Weasel]

A long gameplay video is coming soon and one of the devs on Twitter said a character creator video was a possibility.

Perfect!

That character creator would be awesome as well